Doctors may have found another common household medicine that helps treat COVID-19 – BGR

• Researchers have found another common drug that may be effective against the new coronavirus.
• A Cleveland Clinic article explains that drugs used to treat medical conditions that may have manifestations similar to COVID-19 could be helpful in managing COVID-19.
• At the top of the list, melatonin, a hormone used as a sleeping pill, shows promise for the treatment of coronaviruses. The drug will need to pass clinical trials before it can be used in COVID-19.

We can add melatonin to the growing list of common drugs available for all kinds of medical conditions that could also be effective against the novel coronavirus. A growing number of reports have shown that vitamin D can prevent severe COVID-19. The UK’s largest coronavirus therapy study, which brought us dexamethasone earlier this year, is now investigating low-dose aspirin as a treatment for COVID-19.

Some studies have shown that aspirin can reduce complications. Similar studies exist for other drugs and supplements, including famotidine, zinc, and vitamin C. This is because one of the biggest obstacles to managing the pandemic remains home treatment of suffering patients. of mild to moderate COVID-19. Melatonin is apparently a promising treatment for coronaviruses, new research shows. The drug is usually given to improve sleep. It was one of the drugs White House doctors gave President Trump after he was diagnosed with COVID-19 in late September, before he was hospitalized.

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Researchers at the Cleveland Clinic have identified melatonin as one of 34 drugs known to be effective against the novel coronavirus. The chart below lists these drugs, marking those that have been in clinical trials.

Scientists used an artificial intelligence platform from the Lerner Research Institute to examine possible drugs that can be reused for the use of COVID-19. The use of melatonin was associated with an almost 30% reduced likelihood of testing positive for the coronavirus. The percentage rose to 52% for African Americans. The researchers used data from the Cleveland Clinic’s COVID-19 registry and adjusted for several parameters, including age, race, smoking history and co-morbidities.

But the researchers say people shouldn’t start taking the drug without consulting their doctor. “Large-scale observational studies and randomized controlled trials are essential to validate the clinical benefits of melatonin for patients with COVID-19, but we are excited about the associations put forward in this study and the opportunity to explore them further, ”Dr Feixiong Cheng said in a statement.

To find promising drugs for treating coronaviruses, researchers analyzed the recordings to identify similarities between manifestations and conditions common to COVID-19 and other diseases. They measured “the proximity between the host’s genes / proteins and those well associated with 64 other diseases in several disease categories (malignant cancer and autoimmune, cardiovascular, metabolic, neurological and pulmonary diseases), where a more narrow indicates a greater likelihood of pathological associations between diseases. “

What this means in practice is that scientists have found that multiple proteins in the structure of the virus are associated with two of the main complications of COVID-19, respiratory distress syndrome and sepsis. “This signals us, then, that a drug already approved to treat these respiratory conditions may have some utility in treating COVID-19 as well by acting on these common biological targets,” Cheng said.

Among the medical conditions that have shown “significant proximity” to the novel coronavirus, the researchers cite “autoimmune (eg, inflammatory bowel disease), pulmonary (eg, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and pulmonary fibrosis) and neurological (eg, depression and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder). “

There is no guarantee that melatonin will actually be effective in COVID-19 therapy. The above list includes chloroquine, a type of drug that has failed in clinical trials so far. Azithromycin has also been studied in combination with hydroxychloroquine and alone with no promising results.

A similar study in late May identified other drugs known to be effective against SARS-CoV-2. Xanax was the best known of them.

The full Cleveland Clinic study is available in PLOS Biology.

Chris Smith started writing about gadgets as a hobby, and before he even knew it he was sharing his take on tech with readers around the world. Whenever he doesn’t write about gadgets, he miserably fails to walk away from them, although he desperately tries. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing.